Thermal processes, such as cutting and welding of materials, are widely used in manufacturing environments. For example, large construction machinery, such as wheel loaders, track-type tractors, motor graders, and the like, incorporate many processes during their manufacture which involve cutting and welding of metals.
The heat and other physical stresses that the materials encounter during these manufacturing processes have an adverse effect on the properties of the material, and create residual stresses, distortions, and the like. It is important to minimize the distortions which occur during the thermal manufacturing processes to maintain the structural integrity of the materials.
A common method for determining and monitoring the effects of thermal processes is to simulate the process by use of a model. It is well known to create models of welding and thermal cutting processes to monitor the stresses and distortions encountered by the material as the process is performed.
However, there are several processes which take place during the manufacture of a product. For example, steel may be processed, the processed steel may be moved and stored, the steel may undergo shot blasting, thermal cutting of the steel may then occur to obtain smaller pieces of material, the pieces may be bent into desired shapes, pieces may be welded together, and the welded components may be machined in various ways. Each of these processes introduces stress and distortions. In addition, the stresses and distortions from one process, e.g., shot blasting, still exists during the next process, e.g., thermal cutting.
Models used at present are designed to determine the stresses and distortions which occur during one process only, i.e., the present process. It would be desirable to model the stresses and distortions during a process, and incorporate the stresses and distortions already encountered during other upstream processes. In addition, it would be desirable to provide the results of a process model to other downstream processes, which are then modeled to determine other stresses and distortions. Furthermore, it would be desirable to determine the overall stresses and distortions of a material based on the accumulation of stresses and distortions that are determined from models of individual processes.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the problems as set forth above.